Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello.
Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha.
You never listen to word that I said
You only seen me
For the clothes that I wear
Or did the interest go so much deeper
It must have been
The colour of my hair.

Public image.
What you wanted was never made clear
Behind the image was ignorance and fear
You hide behind his public machine
Still follow the same old scheme.

Public image.
Two sides to every story
Somebody had to stop me
I'm not the same as when I began
I will not be treated as property.

Public image.
Two sides to every story
Somebody had to stop me
I'm not the same as when I began
It's not a game of Monopoly.

Public image.
Public image you got what you wanted
The Public Image belongs to me
It's my entrance
My own creation
My grand finale
My goodbye

General CommentAt the beginning he's also saying that some of those "punks" that the Sex Pistols influenced only saw it as an image without paying much attention to the ideas and messages they were expressing in and out of the music. And he says he's going to be an individual, not a cliched cartoon. It's ironic how today most punk has become a cliche, which is what they were originally railing against.

General Commentgood point. I hate people who try to be punks just to sell records without caring about the punk ideas and it original meaning. Joe Strummer must be rolling in his grave. They are doing exactly what great punks like Lydon were against.

The original meaning of punk was the same as the original meaning of Rock n Roll: a burst of melodic energy delivered by passionate but unremarkable musicians. It happened about 12 years after that first shot. No offense to those who worship at their alters, but by the time the Pistols and the Clash adapted to the fashion ('76), punk was already a commercial enterprise. Indeed, they're probably the two groups that most represented that commercialization (the Clash, for adapting their sound to the trend post-facto and the Pistols, for focusing on fashion [founded by the owner of a boutique, not a musician or an artist] rather than music OR ethos; further, they both became rather popular with major marketing machines behind them while other innovators languished until later).

Lydon of course realized this and was not particularly proud of his role in a marketing scheme that ultimately killed some of his closest friends and thus, PiL was born as an actual attempt to make interesting, anti-commercial music more related to the real "punk" revolution underway in the late '70s, i.e., the No Wave of New York, the New Wave of Ohio (Pere Ubu and Devo), the Rock in Opposition movement in continental Europe (with its roots in England, but its most essential fan base anywhere but) and the Dub of Jamaica.

While I agree with a lot of your points, specifically about punk honing the same spirit as rock 'n' roll, I think you're missing a very essential aspect of the punk ethos in that punk, at its heart, was about not confining oneself to a uniform mentality. It was sort of existential in that way, partnered with its obsession with wilful self-definition. Punk was about progress, it was about proposing new ideas even if it meant you had to be a bit violent with it, and while that may seem absurd in light of the spirit of '77 (ie. sped up Chuck Berry riffs), that stripping down was necessary for the musical landscape to expand its mind artistically. Had that not happened, rock music would have continued to be a very bedenimed, 20-minute drum solo sort of thing, which oftentimes isn't so much progressive as it is complacent and indulgent. This is why The Clash and John Lydon were able to thrive where other less imaginative bands weren't. they didn't confine themselves to any guidelines. The Clash had adopted the sounds of dub reggae, rock 'n' roll, soul, funk, rap, musique concrete, and everything in between by London Calling and Sandinista, and even much of the post-debut singles and Give 'Em Enough rope. John Lydon formed PiL, which was infinitely more interesting than the Sex Pistols in my opinion and, as you said, informed by dub and noise, etc. What I'm saying is that The Clash and Sex Pistols (or rather, John Lydon), if anything, LEAST reflect the commercialization of punk because, for the most part, they were fiercely independent in how they made their music, and because they managed to grow where less notable bands of the scene fell flat on their face. As far as being on major labels goes, the fact of the matter is that the '70s were a time where you pretty much needed that if you wanted your music to reach anybody outside of your country. Hell, The Clash's debut didn't even come to America until '79, long after the fact. And, for the record, saying The Clash adapted their sound to the Pistols is vastly reductive. The Clash owes to the Pistols, sure, but the Pistols owe to The Ramones and New York Dolls, who owe to The Stooges and The Beach Boys and Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis, and so on and so forth.